CHICAGO – Indian Automobile major Tata Motors will announce its acquisition of British luxury car units Jaguar and Land Rover from the struggling US automobile manufacturer Ford Motor Co. on March 5 or 6, reported the industry press on Monday.

Land Rover’s Range Rover Sport
(Credit: Land Rover USA)

Top authorities of both Tata and Ford discussed with the British union leaders last week to take a final decision prior to drawing up a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for the sale.

“The sooner everything gets settled, the better,” said Roger Maddison, the national officer of Unite, the largest union in the UK auto industry. Tata has accepted to meet the demands raised by the Jaguar-Land Rover (JLR) union leaders, said Maddison.

An important question is that whether Tata would persist in obtaining the engines and other techniques from Ford’s manufacturing unit. Ford officials were not immediately available for comment.

A reliable source within Ford informed that the announcement was being delayed for the launch of the new version Ford Fiesta at the Geneva auto show next week. India’s auto major Tata has been in discussion with Ford since it led the race to buy the two luxury car units.

Labor union Unite on last Friday, announced that it had made constructive talks with Tata regarding the take over of Jaguar and Land Rover. Unite is the major trade union which represents the labors of Jaguar and Land Rover. It consists of nearly 12,000 members. Ford refused to comment on Monday, but said that it expects a deal early in 2008.

Dave Osborne, the national secretary of the Unite union, said Tata had promised to provide a long term job security for the JLR workers. “Tata denied the rumour that it had no plan to manufacture Land Rover in India or to offload Jaguar after the deal,” said Osborne. John Gardiner, the representative of Ford refused to comment on dates for the sale.

Tata Motors will enter in to an agreement with Unite, the labor union of Jaguar-Land Rover (JLR) and Ford the within a few days, to cement the deal regarding the takeover of brands, expected early March.

Tata is considering the demands raised by Unite union such as keeping the production units within UK, job security for JLR workers, maintenance of pension scheme and to make terms and conditions to ensure that employment and engineering work will not be offshored.

“We expect an agreement early this March” said the spokesperson of Ford. But Tata refused to comment. “It is a confidential process and we don’t want to comment on these matters” said the spokesperson of Tata.

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